In The End
by Ciaccona
Summary: My First Fic, awww. Big fat episode 25 spoiler: after his triumph, Light considers L's true name.


In the end, it didn't matter how great L's ability was: Kira only had to outsmart Rem. In fact, if L hadn't been so brilliant, she may never have felt it necessary to kill him at all.

How fortunate was her devotion to Misa. She'd conveniently destroyed herself and L, as well as Watari for good measure. There was no longer anything standing in Kira's way.

Light Yagami dusted off the black notebook before opening it to the final entry: L Lawliet.

_Ryuuzaki's true name… L Lawliet. L's name was actually the letter L? He was going by his real name – first name at least – the whole time? Neither of these seems likely. Although, that may the very reason he did it._

Uncertainty. For a split-second, Light considered the possibility that L had somehow cheated him and was, at this very moment, alive and plotting from somewhere behind the scenes. But it was impossible, because if so then Rem would not be ash and Light would not be holding this notebook. No trick of L's could have fooled the eyes of a shinigami. He was really, truly, _one hundred percent_ finished.

_I did it. I won. I've finally defeated L! He's dead! Dead! Died in my arms! And he knew. I saw him looking. Dying. He was right all along and there was nothing he could do about it. Nothing! He's nothing now! Gone!_

It was only when he saw the notebook trembling that Light realised. His bottled-up mirth barked suddenly in the silence of his apartment, and he found himself shaking with laughter, caught up in the elation of winning.

His cell phone went off, and he quickly got a grip on himself. It was Misa, calling to annoy him about something or other; he wasn't really listening to her. His eyes roamed across the open notebook and fell on the name _L Lawliet,_ setting him off again.

"Hello? Light? Hey, Light! Are you listening to me? … Are you okay?"

"Misa, I've never been better."

"Oh. It sounded kind of like you were crying."

No, but he didn't really want to admit that he'd been cackling like some crackpot cartoon villain either, so he ended the conversation and hung up before she could question him further.

L Lawliet.

Something was definitely not right about that name. Would Ryuuzaki really have hidden his true name in plain sight of everyone, even if it was only his first name? Had he trusted in the sheer strangeness of a single-letter name to keep his identity safe? Never. It was only safe from the forward point of view: Ryuuzaki had never divulged anything about his past, but he hadn't been born a shady, world-class detective. Someone out there had to have known the child L, the infant L.

It may have been the name that killed him, but it couldn't have been the name he was born with.

_Wait…_

Light Yagami was momentarily transfixed. Then, his lip curled in a cruel grin. Even dead, Ryuuzaki still challenged him, whether he'd planned to or not.

_Changing names._ Light had never really considered it before. He had always assumed a person's true name to be whatever was given to them at birth, but people commonly changed their legal names, most often by marrying. It was obvious enough; it had just never struck him this way before.

However L had come to possess a different name, marriage wasn't even a consideration. Neither was a change via deed poll, because Ryuuzaki would never have changed his legal name to match his secret identity. And it didn't seem likely that the death note, a supernatural weapon was bound to a mundane thing like the human legal system.

No. The change was unofficial and probably involuntary too. The man had lived and worked in isolation, following cases from country to country, keeping up dozens of different identities. No time for resting: sleep was replaced by sugar and coffee to keep that brilliant mind working continuously. No time to develop a social conscience, painfully evident in the quirky behaviour that made him stick out like a sore thumb in any crowd. It all came with the unthinkable job of being L. And in the end, he simply stopped considering himself as anything else.

Briefly, Light Yagami wondered which name Ryuuk would write when the time came.


End file.
